Ben Affleck and Matt Damon Team for True Life Story of Nike Sneaker Man Sonny Vaccaro
Amazon Studios, Skydance Sports, and Mandalay Pictures are behind the sports marketing drama about a fledgling running shoe company called Nike pursuing the most transformative athlete in the history of sports: Michael Jordan.
Affleck will direct, write, co-star and produce the untitled sports marketing drama while Damon will star and also write and produce. Mandalay Pictures, the banner run by Peter Guber and Jason Michael Berman, will produce as well.
Damon will portray Vaccarro while Affleck plays Nike co-founder Phil Knight.
The story revolves around Nike’s longshot effort to sign rising superstar basketball player Michael Jordan to its shoe company in the mid-eighties, an endorsement that seemed impossible at the time but thanks to the maverick sneaker salesman, would become the most significant relationship between an athletic brand and an athlete.
The deal launched the global, multi-billion-dollar contemporary sneaker industry and also helped the sport do the same.
The 2015 ESPN 30 for 30 documentary titled Sole Man centered on Vaccaro and his story.
Skydance Sports president Jon Weinbach, who served alongside Mandalay chairman Guber as one of the producers of the Emmy-winning Jordan series The Last Dance, was integral in obtaining Vaccaro’s life rights.
Weinbach worked with the basketball industry veteran when he co-directed Sole Man with now Skydance Sports senior vp Dan Marks. Mandalay first picked up the original screenplay titled Air Jordan and penned by Alex Convery and then brought the project to Weinbach at Skydance Sports.
Affleck and Damon are now reworking the script for the project, which will be the first major feature from David Ellison’s newly-minted Skydance Sports division. Skydance already has a tie to the sports world through its investor, RedBird Capital.
The project will mark the first time Affleck will direct a feature starring his long-time pal, Damon. The two famously won an Oscar for writing the script for Good Will Hunting, which starred Damon and had Affleck in a supporting role and was directed by Gus van Sant. The pair also reunited last year for The Last Duel, directed by Ridley Scott, with Damon again starring and Affleck in a supporting role.
Convery is a Black List regular, with his script Bag Man landing in the 2018 list and his Stan Lee biopic Excelsior! featured on the 2020 list.
